All this to say that the traffic at Brussels Airport was intense, especially diplomatically and militarily speaking.
Here are the main points before moving on to the photos of all these aircraft.
The month started on February 1st with the arrival of two Airbus A330 MRTT from Eindhoven for the Royal journey scheduled on February 2nd to the Dubai World Expo. The T-058 headed south, while the T-055, as spare, returned to its home base.
On February 5th, the second Air Belgium Boeing B747, the M-ABOV, arrived on the civil aviation side. The two aircraft are still waiting side by side on the Yankee taxiway to be put into service.
February 13th was marked by the landing at Brussels Airport of an unusual visitor, namely the FAC001 Colombian Air Force One bringing Colombian President Ivan Duque Marquez for a visit to NATO on February 14th. Once the meeting was over, FAC001 left the capital of Europe for the European authorities in Strasbourg for a meeting scheduled on February 15th.
Then it was the turn of the 6th Africa-European Union summit which was scheduled for 17 and 18 February. This summit was called "Hybrid" because some delegations were physically present and others had opted for video-conferencing.
From February 14th, the participants arrived until February 17th, the first day of the summit. Departures took place on February 18th and 19th. The governmental planes were clearly exotic with the proud markings of their nations, but it also became clear that many delegations had rented business jets. So there were far fewer shimmering liveries wearing the markings of the different nations.
Everything evolves, everything changes.
On February 20th and 21st, it was the turn of an extraordinary European Council concerning the long-term budget for 2021-2027, this time bringing along a number of the usual European government aircraft. What a lot of back and forth in this month of February! Incredible, uneconomical and polluting. And it's the man with his little gazoline fueld car that gets pointed!
It was also during the period February 14th-21st that the storm "Eunice" blew with all its force over Belgium and Europe, sometimes making approaches difficult or inducing diversions from or to Brussels Airport.
But this was nothing compared to the storm that started to blow over Ukraine on February 24th.
The last visit to Brussels Airport by a plane chartered by the Ukrainian government took place on February 18th, shortly before Vladimir Putin announced the independence of the Donetsk and Lugansk republics in the disputed Donbass region on February 21st.
Faced with this rise in power of Russia, an extraordinary "hybrid" Council of Ministers of Foreign Affairs was held on Sunday February 27th, with once again a ballet of planes sporting the 27 nation flags.
A busy month, as we can see, which will probably have heavy consequences for many people physically, psychologically or economically.